Style Alert: FoHawk

So last week's post was basically just an advertisement for my show celebrating the one year anniversary of my debut album, "Love, Loss, Lies", haha, so I wanted to give another style update/tutorial this week.

Photo: FULLOFLAVA

I was deciding between a couple options for how I wanted to wear my hair for the concert and finally went with a fohawk look. Here's how to achieve the look!

"Love, Loss, Lies" LIVE

This week I wanted to take a brief deviation from the "regularly scheduled program" to share my excitement with my concert tomorrow celebrating the one year anniversary of the release of my debut album, "Love, Loss, Lies"! 

STYLE ALERT: Pigtails

A simple to achieve, cute, and quick hairdo is PIGTAILS :) 

I really like this "blast to the past" style and it can be dressed up, funky, or cutesy… Here's an example from an interview I did wearing some funky pigtails with a twist: I used fishtail braid technique instead of a regular 3 strand plait.

Length Check!

About a year and a half ago, I cut my hair for the first time in my life…after like 23 years of growth! 

It was kind of semi-traumatic, haha. I definitely missed my hair, even though it was only about 5 or 6 inches (what am I going to do when I cut it all!?). I think I've finally grown it back though. 

SO time for a length check!

Top 20 'Natural' Barbie Beauties

Traditionally, when you think "Barbie" you don't really think natural hair in that same thought bubble…but lately I've been seeing some absolutely beautiful natural hair barbies! 

(Just a little barbie music while you read lol…)

Here's my top 20 list….These should definitely be more widely available/accessible in stores…

The Battle Continues...

Last week I posted about the "war" on natural hair and it seems that the battle continues within the actual context of war as well.

One of my friends recently sent me an article that discusses the army's new "grooming regulations". Decide for yourself, but again, they seem specifically designed to marginalize and denigrate natural hair/traditional "black styles" and really just women in general for some of the rules.

AR (Army Regulation) 670-1 makes twists, both 

flat twists and as well as two strand twists 

as well as dreadlocks, which are defined as 

"any matted or locked coils or ropes of hair" 

unauthorized hairstyles.

Read the Article here:  http://www.myfoxla.com/story/25142086/soldiers-claim-grooming-regulations-are-racist

However, I will say that in this specific case, some of the regulations make sense and seem to have a basis in safety standards instead of this "professionalism" standard. For example, wearing scrunchies that are similar to hair color only or not adding beads to braided styles, or ensuring that hair is properly secured all make safety sense to me. On the other hand, regulating whether the part in their hair is a straight line, whether the cut is symmetrical, whether they wear locs or twists?….those bans seem to be a bit overboard.

Here is the complete AR 670-1: http://www.apd.army.mil/pdffiles/r670_1.pdf

Are you interested in SIGNING THE PETITION?

Do you think that the new regulations are outrageous or do they make sense to you?

- "Mo hair"

 

Rahkua Ishakarah

rahkua.com

iHEARTrahkua@gmail.com

I Declare War?

Besides the everyday struggle of getting "validation" from the general population, Naturals also face a more problematic issue: the systematic implementation of institutionalized natural hair discrimination. Maybe that's a bit of a mouthful but it speaks to a very real problem that marginalizes our hair choices and deems them inferior.